We’re sharing Name that book! images on Instagram over the next few weeks. Follow us at nashvillepubtv to see how many books you can identify from the list of 100 titles on The Great American Read list. We plan to post three images every Wednesday through early August and we’ll post the answers the following week with the next round of images.

The idea behind Name that book! is to create a fun way to remind people of favorite books they may have read years and years ago.

To do this, I fill our Great American Read frame with objects that represent the essence of a book from the list of 100 best-loved novels. I choose books that will be relatively easy to recognize and ones I am somewhat familiar with. After a search on Google Images and Pinterest, I make a list of important symbols and distinguishable items that best characterize each novel. I send my wish list off to the props master at the Nashville Repertory Theatre (our neighbors here at NPT) and receive a box of props in return. If necessary, I print off images to further help symbolize the book and then arrange all my objects in the most aesthetically pleasing way.

Some books are easier to illustrate than others. We had an abundance of easily recognizable objects for Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland: the Mad Hatter’s hat, a teapot and playing cards. Others, like Beloved, were more difficult. I tried my best to distinguish that book’s literary symbols like the black, wide-brimmed hat that represented the fear of being taken back into slavery.